Back By Morning
by No Holds
Summary: Marlene has been called many things. A monster, a great leader, a terrorist, a friend. But something that everyone agreed on was that she always kept her promises. She's always expected the same of others. Elsewhere, the newest firefly is breaking a promise that is the furthest thing from her mind. Run in parallel with Gone By Morning (/s/10154339/1)
1. The Previous Evening (Prologue)

The girl's name was Riley Abel. She was very young and very brave and very, _very_ headstrong. She'd fought to get to me and fought to get me to listen, and I'd told her she'd die if she didn't fuck off and go home.

Well, maybe that was putting it too nicely.

I'd tied her up and threatened her with a gun and still she'd come back, and that kind of resolve warrants recognition.

So I'd had her dog tag made. It was bright and new, the only dents were the letters of her name stamped into the soft metal. It'd been a long time since I'd seen a brand new tag- the ones on even the newest fireflies are worn dark by the years, dented and bent, more scratch then surface. We don't get many new recruits, anymore.

Truth is, I can't really say no to this girl. We're dying out. The fireflies are on the brink of extinction, and a girl like Riley, a girl with all the conviction I used to have, she could turn the tide.

There was only one hang-up.

It was another girl- one I'd promised to keep safe. Riley's best friend, who'd follow her anywhere- even into the line of fire. I couldn't risk that. I might not be much anymore, but at least I kept my promises.

I'd thought for a good long time about what to do- how to keep Ellie safe and Riley with us. I knew all too well how dangerous a friendship could be in this world. It's what trapped me with the Ellie problem in the first place.

Knowing what I know about these two, there was only one way to keep Ellie from following her friend- and it was to move Riley somewhere that she _couldn't_ be followed. Another city, where they couldn't talk, where (I hoped) they'd drift apart and forget about each other.

And now Riley is sitting outside my office, waiting for my verdict. I can hear her fidgeting through the door, impatient, anxious, hoping only for my approval, for her acceptance into the fireflies. When I reach for the intercom I hesitate for only a moment.

"Come on in, Riley."

She walks in with her back ramrod straight and her shoulders squared, hands jammed deep into pockets. She looks me straight in the eye, all cocky teenager and trying-too-hard.

"Relax."

If anything, the girl gets more tense, jaw tightening around an uncomfortable smile, glancing away to stare at her feet.

"And welcome to the fireflies."

Riley's eyes flicker to mine, this desperate hope flashing across her face, and God she's _young_, she's _so_ young.

I pass over her dog tag, and the girl _lights up_, still professional, still at attention, but all smiles and bright eyes, holding the tag like it's some precious thing, something delicate to be cradled and treasured.

She reaches up to fasten it around her neck, and I bite through my conscience to deliver the news.

"You're transferring to your post in the morning. Be here at 7 sharp."

Riley's hands freeze at the clasps of the chain, and she's looking up at me with questions in her eyes.

I pretend not to notice.

"We're moving you to another city where they need reinforcements, so have your bags packed."

I don't meet her eyes, but I can see her fighting with herself, see her bite her lip and ball her fists.

"Bullshit." She says, then winces.

"Excuse me?"

Riley flinches, but she doesn't really back down, just squares her jaw and takes a deep breath.

"I said its bullshit. I know you need reinforcements in this city, you know I have friends here. You can't just up and move me like that, it's bullshit and you know it."

"Then give back the tag, Abel. You can transfer, or you can leave right now."

Dead silence. pin-drop silence. When I look back at Riley, I see something in her break.

Her eyes drop. Her shoulders curl in a little. Her eyes go wet, but tears don't spill over, and despite myself I'm impressed.

"Okay," she says, after a long moment. "I'll be here in the morning."

When I dismiss her, She lets herself out, head high and feet dragging.

When I'm sure she's out of range, I radio the guards.

"If you see a girl sneaking out tonight, don't stop her. She's got my leave. Notify me if she's not back by morning"

Knowing what I know about Riley, she'll try to leave and say goodbye.

And hell, who am I to stop her? In this world, few enough of us get to leave on our own terms, let alone say goodbye.

Besides, I was certain that she'd be back by morning.


	2. The First Morning (Chapter 1)

I wake up at five to a note shoved under my door. The writing is messy and slanting, ink smeared by a lazy hand.

_Marlene-_

_The girl left like you said, and she's still gone. You said to tell you if she didn't come back, but I'm off duty now. It's around three. Told the next shift to write you a note if anything changed._

That was fine. Riley still had two hours to get back. I read over old letters and wait.

At five thirty, I have breakfast and watch out the windows. She still has an hour and a half to get here.

At six, I make the trip to Riley's room, to make sure she didn't sneak back unnoticed. He bed's neatly made, her clothing folded into a duffle bag. Surely she would have brought her clothing if she were planning on staying gone. She'd be back. She had an hour.

At six thirty, I'm back in my office, watching the door. It's pathetic. What do I care about one irresponsible teenager showing up late?

I remind myself that she's not late yet. She still has half an hour.

At seven, I tell the man on watch to alert me if he sees a teenage girl, and I go back to sleep.

At seven fifteen, I admit that I can't sleep and pace, pace, pace around my room, wondering why I trusted someone so obviously headstrong, wondering why I _care_ so much. Fireflies disappear every day, most without anyone to remember that they ever lived, without a so much as an unmarked grave.

At eight in the morning, I call in a favour with a contact at the boarding school to ask if _they've_ seen anything.

At nine, the boarding school contact tells me that one of their students has gone missing too, that she left all her clothing behind, that no one had seen her since the previous day, that she had a history of disappearing, of making trouble with a girl called Riley.

At ten, I try and put the issue out of my mind. If Riley's run away, then she's run away. If she's coming back, she'll come back when she wants to and no sooner.

At eleven in the morning, I pace around the facility and ask if anyone has seen Riley, if anyone knows where she is. A few people saw her leave, but no one's seen her come back. I catch a few people giving me funny looks, but they all shrink back when I meet their eyes.

At eleven thirty, I go back to her room and look for clues as to why she's still gone.

At twelve, I find a wad of crumpled paper shoved under her bed.

Feeling pathetic for letting this bizarre concern spiral so far out of control, I toss the note on the ground and turn to leave.

At twelve fourteen, I still haven't left the girl's room. I give in to temptation.

The paper's been crumpled so much it's soft at the edges, worn. The ink's smudged, and more words have been crossed out then written.

_"Dear Ellie,_

_I didn't mean anything I said before. I joined the Fireflies and they're making me move to another city but I'll write you if"_

The next few lines are scribbled out.

_"I'm really sorry I was a jerk. I'm gonna miss you."_

The ink here is smeared, like something got it wet, but it's only unreadable because Riley had scribbled through the lines, pressing hard enough to tear the paper.

_"I never told you how I really feel and I was going to but last-minute confessions are way to sappy for me and"_

The rest of the letter is scribbled out in another colour of ink, and at the bottom of the page Riley's written

_"Go and tell her yourself, you coward."_ In a wide, messy hand. She'd pressed too hard with the pen here, and the paper's bumpy and torn where the nib pushed through.

At twelve thirty, I straighten and remind myself that I'm too old to care this much about one girl, that I've seen too much to be fussed about the disappearance of another Firefly.

I put the letter back where I found it and do my job. From what I've seen she intended to come back, and I'm not going to worry about something I can't change.

At eleven at night I tell the man on watch to tell me if Riley returns, and I go to sleep.

Maybe she needed an extra day. She'll be back tomorrow, if she's coming back.


	3. The Second Morning (Chapter 2)

I wake up to the sun filtering into my room, watery and grey like only spring sunlight can be.

There's movement in the hall, and voices in the yard, which means I overslept.

Getting dressed takes less time then it did before the outbreak- when the choice is a dirty hoodie or a dirty hoodie, deciding what to wear isn't an especially lengthy affair.

The only care I take is the minute to polish my dog tag, dirty water and vinegar and a greasy rag to keep the metal shining, and allegedly keep up morale, or so I'd been told by some weedy strategist from a couple years back.

He had died in a routine military raid, though, so maybe his advice wasn't the most reliable in the world. But hell, hardly anyone's word is reliable anymore, and it's become something of a daily ritual by now. I'm the leader of the goddamn Fireflies. I can afford thirty seconds to polish a bit of tin.

The guard outside my door salutes when I walk by.

"Marlene."

I nod. "Any change with the girl?"

She shakes her head. "None that I've heard of."

I shove the news to the back of my mind and join the other Fireflies in the mess hall. No use worrying about what I can't change.

It's one of those days where everything goes by too fast to think, and I'm signing papers and giving orders and planning raids until noon, too busy with things that actually matter to worry about the girl.

When everyone shuffles of to lunch, I finally have the chance to catch my breath, and when I take a seat the pathetic, grating _worry_ creeps back into my mind, an anxiety that has no place here. People die all the time. One missing girl- she might not even be dead- is hardly something to fuss over.

At twelve thirty I find myself pacing, wondering, thinking that maybe the girl's gotten into some trouble, thinking maybe I ought to send out a search party.

At one PM lunch ends, and the responsibility of the Fireflies returns in a tide of rowdy, unwashed humanity, and the idea of a search party for the girl is pushed to the back of my mind by losses and new territory and search parties for things that actually matter.

At seven the work day ends. It's dinner for the day shift and breakfast for the night shift, the only time in the day when all the Fireflies are together.

That dead analyst said it was important to socialize with the troops, but he's dead, so I skip out on dinner (a bad habit I am loath to break) and return to my room, catching the first moments of total silence I've had since waking up.

I read treaties and letters and ledgers and trade inventories (one handgun and some ammo missing from the weapon cache closest to Riley's quarters) until the light coming through the window is too dim to see by, then I get up and watch the sunset, like I do every evening.

That analyst probably would have said something about routine making you predictable, getting you killed. I say it's hard to run a military group without some order, and my heart's still beating.

The rain's stopped by now, and if I was a romantic I'd probably appreciate tonight's sunset more, might say it was soft, might notice how it catches in the smoke and the clouds and turns the smog iridescent. I'm not a romantic, though.

I wonder if the girl's still in the city, if she can see the sunset. I wonder if she's in any condition to be seeing the sunset, and shove the thought away. Riley was too tough to get killed.

And too busy too waste time watching the sunset.

Like I am.

I pull down the blinds and light a candle and read until my eyes are crossing, lids heavy, then I crawl into my bed and welcome sleep.

It will not come, no matter how I seek it.

I've killed too many people to count, and seen too many horrors to speak of, and never lost a minute of sleep about it.

But this- this fucking _kid_ was keeping me up at night, worrying like some overbearing mother goose.

Even as I acknowledge it as pathetic, a part of me worries.

What if she's _not_ okay?

What if she _did_ run away?

I shake away the thought, absurdly glad none of the Fireflies can see me now.

I'm not exactly the picture of an unshakable leader at the moment.

I flip the pillow over and content myself with the thought that the girl has a gun, and if you're smart (which she was) and quick (Which she was) and you have a gun, it's damn hard to get hurt in this city.

As long as she only fired to defend herself, as long as she wasn't distracted, Riley would be just fine, wherever she was.

Just fine.


	4. The Third Morning (Chapter 3)

I wake up at 4 in the morning expecting peace and quiet-It's too early for anyone else to be awake, and I'm looking forwards to waking up slowly for once.

Instead I find static and radio chatter, a low hum of activity that can only mean one thing.

A military raid.

I shove myself out of bed, momentarily grateful for the bad habit that is sleeping in my clothing, and rap on the door.

"Raid?"

The doors are old and the walls thin, and the reply comes clear as day.

"We got a tip off that they're doing a sweep of the area first thing tomorrow."

I gather what I have into a bag prepared for just this purpose, and I'm out of the room in minutes.

"Go pack up." I tell the guard at my door. "There's nothing in there worth protecting anymore."

He nods and bustles away, all urgency and impatience.

By Four fifteen, I'm jogging past the barracks to the mess hall, and when I pass the girl's room I stop dead.

_She's not coming back, Marlene. You've got people to worry about. People who are here right now._

I look around at the bustle of people moving past, some panicked, packing to run and hide away for a day. It would be selfish to bring an extra bag. It would be selfish to take more space then I warrant.

Most of Riley's things are already packed neatly into a duffle bag- she was supposed to leave a few days ago. I gather the rest of her belongings and stuff them in, grabbing the bag and running to keep up with the crowd.

Just in case she comes back. After all, it's expensive and difficult to replace personal items in this day and age. If she comes back, it'll be in our best interest not to have to find her new things.

In the mess hall, there's a rapidly growing pile of duffle bags, soon to be shuttled off to safe houses and hidey holes where the military- dense and always eager not to find anything- won't look.

The girl's bag is covered in cartoonish drawings, sharpie scribbles of faces and animals. The name Ellie is signed near the zipper, next to a lopsided smiley face.

I get a few odd looks when I pile up her bag along with my own, but when I meet the onlookers' eyes they shrink away like ice in summer sun.

By seven in the morning, everything's been packed away into safe hiding holes but the Fireflies themselves, who shuffle and talk amongst themselves.

Everyone's got a place to hide- or else a friend with a place to hide- and they're all just waiting for their dismissal.

At seven thirty, I stop waiting for stragglers and give the orders to ship out. The Fireflies scatter from the mess hall like pool balls, rushing towards their safe houses in every direction.

At eight, I'm in my own hideout, this old to floor hotel room with the stairs blown out. There are two big guys with more gun then brain with me, personal bodyguards in case the military decides to actually do their job properly for once.

I'm not betting on needing them.

The room's dark and musty, windows boarded up, the rope ladder that is my only way up and down coiled safely in the corner of the room.

I settle in to wait, taking a seat on a rotting couch that probably wasn't even clean before the outbreak. I'm calm, but the two big guys clearly haven't done this before- they're restless, shuffling and pacing and fussing impatiently. Their fidgeting is driving me crazy, catching in the corner of my eye like a hangnail.

I don't want to tell them to stop-the fidgeting's clearly a nervous tick, and I don't have time for Exercises in futility- so I shut myself in the bathroom, not bothering with the rusted lock.

Wherever she is, I hope the girl's found a safe place to hide. Getting caught with a firefly pendant in this city's worse then a death sentence.

The kid was smart, though. She'd figure it out.


	5. The Fourth Morning (Chapter 4)

I wake up at about three in the morning when military sirens kick up, screaming through the city in a way that is probably supposed to be intimidating.

I sit down, staying under the windows, out of sight. Nothing I haven't done a thousand times before.

The muscle I brought along with me is a whole different story. They'd spent the day anxious, pacing and finger-drumming, but the moment the sirens start they go stock-still, and I see fight-or-flight written clear on both of their faces.

_Shit._

The bigger guy looks fit to bolt, and you don't survive doing what I do as long as I've been doing it if you don't know how to recognize when someone was about to do something stupid.

"Hey. You. Big guy. You got a name?"

The guy looks over, jumpy as hell. He works his jaw for a little bit, eyes wide and whites showing, and his buddy steps in.

"That there's Marv. I'm Rick." His voice cracks like a damn teenager.

God help me if I didn't get the two most nervous 6-foot-6, 200-pound guys in the whole damn city.

"Alright. Well, if the two of you would sit down under the windows so the military can't see us, that'd be great."

Marv just stands there, huge ham-hands clenching and unclenching.

I've got to remember to improve the training for new Fireflies - freezing up like this anywhere else would be a death sentence.

And all because of some sirens.

I hope the other new Fireflies are doing better then this. I'm sure most of them haven't been through any raids yet. They must be terrified.

"Hey. Marv."

No response.

I clear my throat, bring out the barking-orders voice.

"_Soldier_."

His head swivels like a fucking owl's, wide eyes locking onto mine.

"Sit the fuck down. And don't make me ask you again."

He sinks against the wall like a sack of meat, slumping beside his buddy.

At eight AM, the sirens cut off abruptly, and both of my useless bodyguards stand up straight away, like the think the raid's over.

I have _got_ to tell someone to train these assholes better.

I motion for them to get down, hissing curses, but they're so jacked-up on adrenaline that it takes a while for my message to get through, and by the time they're sitting back down it's too late.

I can hear soldiers yelling on the streets below, demanding that we turn ourselves in, firing shots up towards the room.

Every single bullet goes way wide- I'm not even sure any of them get to this floor of the hotel, but it's only a matter of time before they try and find a way up.

It figures that after all this time I'd get killed in a routine military sweep.

I get as low as I can and grab my gun and hope to hell they don't care enough to come up here.

I strain to hear any signs of activity, try to stay as quiet as possible.

Even breathing seems loud.

The _extremely heavy breathing_ of the two guys sitting next to me sure isn't helping.

At ten in the morning, the military has apparently had enough, and I hear their truck rattle away.

I stand up and shoot after them once they've gone out of earshot, yelling insults. Gotta look brave for the muscle.

Rick and Marv yell obscenities and give the back of the military the middle finger. I laugh, pent-up adrenaline and draining tension making me feel stupid and invincible.

We wait another couple hours, to make sure they're really gone.

At one PM, I uncoil the rope ladder and make sure the big guys go down first. Just in case.

At two PM, we're back at camp, adrenaline long gone.

I'm smart enough that I know I got damn lucky.

I'm only still breathing because the military got lazy. Letting those big guys get seen should have been a death sentence.

But hell, I survived. And it's always good to have a reminder of what the world's like, once in a while. That's the last time I let anyone else pick my bodyguards for me, that's for certain.

Learn something new every day.

I just hope the other new Fireflies did better then my muscle did.

Or at least got as lucky.


	6. The Fifth Morning (Chapter 5)

I wake up as the last of the stragglers make their way into camp, talking too-loud, all bravado and wild eyes, wandering in with the sunrise.

By the time the base has settled into a normal rhythm again, it's nearly noon, the nervous babble and disorganized wandering and quiet mourning dying down as adrenaline fades.

Most of the Fireflies made it back safe, but too many didn't- new recruits, all of them- and I can see the empty spaces they leave more then I ever saw them when they were here.

Not making it back safe has become something of a habit for new recruits, as of late.

The girl's duffel bag is still sitting on my bed where I'd thrown it the moment I got back, where I've been ignoring it ever since.

What little I have has been squared away, unpacked and folded neatly back into place.

But one look at Riley's duffel bag and my skin crawled and my hands itched, and I had to get out for a moment.

Was it immature and cowardly? Yes.

But I'm the leader of the Fireflies, and if I want to watch the newest recruits drill instead of throwing out a bag of clothing like I should be, I can damn well watch the newest recruits drill.

I watch them learn to shoot properly, erasing years of doing it wrong, of hard travel and self-taught survival, eyes bunched at the corners, too-stiff, over thinking, eager to please.

Unwanted and unexpected, pride swells in my chest, watching these street rats, lean and hard with the road.

The new recruits were all strays, living months or years on the road, and in shows in their scars, in the way they all wear their hair short, in the way they flinch at loud sounds.

And here they are. Here they are learning that fight-or-flight isn't one sided, they had come to _me_ to fight, these lean-hungry people who have seen enough fighting to last a lifetime joined up- out of duty or desperation or idealism, I don't know- but here they are, all fighting for what I told them to believe in.

Watching them now is a reminder I don't want.

These people are relying on me to be the light they've been looking for, and if I can't even look at a duffel bag I have no place leading them.

I nod to their trainer, a hard man who snaps to attention like a wind-up-toy, and the new Fireflies all flinch or offer sloppy salutes, off-time and out-of-practice, and for the first time in five days I feel this _hope_.

They are why I'm doing this.

Somewhere around four Pm, I'm in the girl's room, duffel bag in hand, and I make the bed up neat, putting everything back just where it came from, packing clothes into drawers, stuffing the duffel bag back under her bed.

The dinner bell rings, and I stand up, following the crowd to the mess hall, listening to them talk and joke and I _know._

For the first time since the girl left, I know why I'm doing this.

I can't give up on the Fireflies.

I _won't_ give up.

Not yet.

**Quick author's note- I'm sorry about the delays as of late. My motivation's been at rock bottom, and Marlene's hard for me to write (as I'm sure you can tell by my general sloppiness in this chapter), so I've been putting this off. But I'll get it done! Feel free to kick my ass if I haven't updated in a while.**


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